Top Essays USB Drive

This USB drive contains 100 of the top This I Believe audio broadcasts of the last ten years, plus some favorites from Edward R. Murrow's radio series of the 1950s. It's perfect for personal or classroom use! Click here to learn more.

The concept of family is applied to many different aspects of our life. A family can be our blood relatives, or simply the people who raise us and their blood relatives or a family can be the people who we work with everyday in the office. To me a family is any group of people you have a strong bond with and that further your life education. Everyone has there own definition of family and possibly their own number of families, since I have been at college I have grown into a new family, a fraternity.

Most fraternities call themselves a group of brothers which alone signifies the bond which they share. However, as has been my experience not all fraternities truly act like brothers let alone a family. In my four years that I have been at University Park campus I was blessed enough to become part of a brotherhood which I truly consider family, Kappa Alpha Order. This family of brothers has taught me a lot about myself and my potential.

To those not keen to the inner workings of a brotherhood, it may seem that a fraternity is simply a network of friends which students pay for so they don’t have to go out and make their own. This cliché does not even scratch the surface of what fraternity life is all about. In my experience I have seen my brothers fight, argue, even raise fists toward each other. However, I have also seen my brothers come together to raise over $100,000 for kids with cancer, win Greek Sing four times in a row, and most importantly learn life lessons through running the fraternity in an environment that is not always happy we are here.

As I prepare to graduate this coming May I am lucky enough to look back on my time at Penn State and be proud of who I have become. My fraternity, my brotherhood, my newest family have taught me so much about who I am and where I need to go once I graduate. I have learned to budget for a group of people, raise funds for charity, and most importantly stand my ground even in the face of some of the people I care most about. Some of these men will be my friends forever, some I will lose touch with and talk too rarely. All of these men are now my brothers and family.

Essay of the Week

A chance encounter in a coffee shop introduced writer Rachel Richardson to a man who had many stories to tell. Ms. Richardson came to understand that everyone has a story, and our lives can be enriched by listening to the stories of others.Click here to read her essay.